Keynote Speakers

Nikesh Desai

CEO, InvestingChannel

Nikesh Desai is CEO of InvestingChannel, an exclusive publisher group and scalable financial marketing platform reaching more than 25M readers each month. Through its portfolio of 200+ financial publishers, InvestingChannel connects brands like OppenheimerFunds, BlackRock and Vanguard, with the right people in the ecosystem: investors, traders and financial professionals. Prior, Nikesh co-founded consultancy Giant Step Strategies, served as VP of Business Development at TheStreet.com, and helped drive PeoplePC’s startup and acquisition by EarthLink. He began his career as an investment banker at Robertson Stephens, involved in public offerings and M&A.

Cassandra Farrington

Co-Founder and President, Anne Holland Ventures, Inc.

Cassandra is the co-founder and CEO of Marijuana Business Daily, and President at Anne Holland Ventures Inc. She entered the world of B2B industry publishing as a junior marketer at Phillips Business Information, and went on to earn her MBA from the University of Texas McCombs School of Business and served as a Vice President at Citi in operational roles prior to co-founding Anne Holland Ventures.

Anne Holland

Co-Founder, Anne Holland Ventures, Inc.

Marijuana Business Daily was recognized by Inc Magazine as the 4th fastest growing media company in America in 2016. Its twice-annual conference MJBizCon was named the fastest growing trade show in America by Trade Show Executive. Holland began her career in business-to-business publishing as a data entry operator in Aviation Daily’s fulfillment department. Next she moved on to working in marketing for such titles as The Oil Daily and Jane’s Fighting Ships, finally serving as a company-wide marketing guru for Phillips Business Information, now Access Intelligence. It was there that Holland first met Cassandra Farrington (then Behringer) in the mid-1990s, when Farrington was looking for her first job out of college and Holland was on the hiring committee. In the dot com boom of 1999, Holland served as a consultant to The Economist and Amazon.com. In 2000, she founded MarketingSherpa, Inc. a publisher of Case Studies and Benchmark Reports and trade shows reaching 250,000 marketing executives in corporate America and the UK. After selling MarketingSherpa, Holland launched and sold two more publishing brands, WhichTestWon, now known as Behave, and Subscription Insider. Finally, in 2011 she co-founded Marijuana Business Daily with Cassandra Farrington, which Farrington continues to lead to this day. Along the way, Holland has served as a keynote speaker at more than 50 conferences in the US and Europe, on topics ranging from publishing and marketing to small business M&A. She has been quoted in the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, Target Marketing, DM News, Fast Company, The Boston Globe and hundreds more media outlets and business books. Currently she resides in Providence RI where she is in the midst of her next startup.

Speakers

Beth Arritt

Director of Marketing, American Association of Airport Executives

Beth Arritt is the Director, Marketing, at the American Association of Airport Executives. Beth leads the marketing efforts for AAAE and its various products and services. Her marketing experience spans more than twenty years and various industries, including puzzles and games, training, education and aviation. She worked on the White House Aviation Commission Conference in 1997, and has been active in the aviation industry throughout her career. In addition to marketing, Beth has worked in event management and web development, wearing a variety of hats in different positions. She has also been an adjunct professor at Marymount University in Arlington, Virginia, teaching marketing.

Jaclyn Baldovin

Online Content Manager, Business Management Daily

Jaclyn leads the social media and video content programs at Business Management Daily. Her role focuses on lead generation campaigns through digital marketing outlets and finding new ways to increase traffic to www.BusinessManagementDaily.com. She also manages webinars on related topics. Jaclyn won the first place SIPAaward for 2014 Best Social Media Success Story and second place SIPAward for 2015 Best Social Media Initiative. She has also worked as a freelance marketing consultant and writer for an entertainment publication.

Tom Billington

Founder and CEO, Billington CyberSecurity

After nearly two decades launching new products/events at Phillips, BNA (now Bloomberg BNA) and Thomson Reuters, Thomas K. Billington founded Billington CyberSecurity in 2010. Since then he has launched a leading annual cybersecurity summit--now in its 8th year--an International cybersecurity forum, a new Leadership Council program and publications. His events feature a cyber who’s who of speakers and sponsors. Event coverage has appeared in The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, and The Washington Post. He is a Brown graduate and holds an MBA from Georgetown University.

Nancy Brand

Managing Director, SIPA

Nancy is responsible for the strategy and day-to-day operations for the Specialized Information Publishers Association (SIPA), which is the leading provider of best practices sharing, training and peer networking for publishers and information providers. Previously, Nancy was the senior director of operations at Chartwell, where she managed marketing, IT, account management, training and sales to support the company’s evolving business strategy. She has overseen the transition from software to cloud-based solutions as well as developed multiple websites. Nancy previously served on SIPA's Board of Directors and has presented at various industry conferences. Nancy graduated from the Georgia Institute of Technology and earned her MBA focusing on data analysis and marketing from Georgia State University.

Chelsea Brookes

Associate eLearning Product Manager, HCPro

HCPro provides training and education on healthcare compliance, reimbursement, and regulation. Chelsea manages the elearning team and works with experts across departments to successfully build, implement, and maintain training courses. She focuses on streamlining processes and maximizing efficiency.

Joseph Cardillo

Marketing Director, Beard Group

Joseph is the Marketing Director for Beard Group, Inc., Law & Business Publishers. Since his start in July 2016, Joseph has revived Beard Group's marketing efforts by bringing consistent exposure and crafting value around their existing publications, and spearheading a number of new initiatives, including the 1st Annual Class Action Money & Ethics Conference recently held in Midtown Manhattan (classactionconference.com), corporate restructuring webinars (beardwebinars.com), and the Beard Group Corporate Restructuring Podcast, available in iTunes.

Guy Cecala

CEO, Inside Mortgage Finance

In 1984, Guy founded Inside Mortgage Finance, a specialized news and information company in Bethesda, MD. Guy is frequently quoted in the Wall Street Journal, the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Los Angeles Times, the Boston Globe, USA Today and other major newspapers as well as AP, Bloomberg and Reuters. He also has appeared on the NBC Today Show, NBC Nightly News, CNBC, ABC News, CBS Evening News, Fox Business News, PBS NewsHour, CNN, the BBC, CBS Radio and NPR as an expert on the U.S. mortgage market.
Mr. Cecala is a past president of SIPA.

Tom Chaffee

CEO, ePublishing

Thomas is CEO of ePublishing, a SaaS company integrating state-of-the-art content tools with behavioral data to drive engagement and maximum profit for publishers from web, mobile and eCommerce. He has a 20-year career spanning publishing, marketing, technology and business performance initiatives. Chaffee is the former Chairman and CEO of Realigent, Inc. and founder of Quickscan Technologies. He was named a Founding Partner in AT&T/Bell Labs’ Strategic Alliance, a program assembling the nation’s top futurists and technology minds. Chaffee is regularly asked to share his entrepreneurial, growth experiences and technology vision with industry leaders.

Matthew Cibellis

Director of Programming, Live & Virtual Events, Education Week

Matthew spearheads event programming for Education Week, the nation’s source for K–12 education news and information. He develops both custom and editorial events showcasing best practices in the field. Annually, he oversees “Leaders To Learn From” and the production of 65+ webinars, live chats, livestreams, and 25 sponsored dinners. Matthew is responsible for developing videos with thought leaders, PSAs with celebrities, and other multimedia projects to generate interest in and drive registration. Matthew has held event leadership roles at Reading Is Fundamental, Post-Newsweek Tech Media Group, Magination Press, and Fox Television.

Ed Coburn

President, Cabot Wealth Network

Ed Coburn is President of investment advisory service publisher Cabot Wealth Network. Previously Ed ran multiplatform publishing businesses at School Family Media, Harvard Health Publications, and Circadian Information. He began his career in publishing at Cahners Business Information and spin-off Cutter Information Corp. He also served as Senior Vice President and lead consultant at publishing strategy and technology firm Mequoda Systems. Ed is on the boards of SIIA and SIPA and is a past President of SIPA

Joseph Coleman

Director of Content, Coleman Publishing

Joseph is the producer of the award winning Coleman Report Live! Podcast. Joseph is an experienced Content Director in e-Learning and video webinar production for business banking professionals. Joseph is the Online Editor, Website Developer & Email Editor for ColemanReport.com. He specializes in content development, SEO, link building, web to email conversion, email marketing, web analytics, and data analysis. He is the producer of Coleman Webinars, Coleman Live Events, and Coleman Certified Training Video.

Wayne Cooper

Managing Director, Greenhaven Partners

Wayne is the Managing Director of Greenhaven Partners, where he and his partners invest in and help build B2B information companies. He is currently the Executive Chairman of Chief Executive Group (publisher of Chief Executive magazine and producer of digital media, events, research and peer networks) and Bongarde (an information and training company in the corporate safety sector).
He and his team have also transformed Kennedy Information, IOFM, Pyramid Research, Media Publishing International and Vizeum. Before becoming an entrepreneur, Wayne was a strategy consultant with Bain & Company and Monitor Company.

Robin Crumby

Co-founder and Managing Director, Novatum Group

Robin co-founded Melcrum in 1996 and sold the business in November 2015. Melcrum is a research and training business, advising executives at Fortune 500 organizations worldwide. Robin stewarded the business from a "kitchen-table" start-up to an organization with offices in the US, UK and Australia and blue-chip customers in more than 90 countries. Based in London, Robin's current focus through Novatum Group is on helping growing businesses thrive in the digital age, sharing his knowledge and experience to accelerate performance. He recently published his first novel 'Hurst' a dystopian thriller set in a castle on the south coast of England.

Brian Cuthbert

Group Vice President, Diversified Communications

Brian Cuthbert is a Group Vice President at Diversified Communications U.S., a global media company with market-leading exhibitions, conferences, digital products and publications.
Mr. Cuthbert is responsible for Diversified Communications’ Business Communities division, overseeing broad portfolio of conferences, tradeshows, and digital products. Brands under Mr. Cuthbert’s stewardship include the Institute of Finance & Management (IOFM), Intersolar North America, The Running Event, Running Insight, American Society of Administrative Professionals, the Administrative Professionals Conference and Accountex USA. Mr. Cuthbert is also part of the Diversified Communications’ leadership team.
Mr. Cuthbert joined Diversified in April 2013 as the Director of Sales for IOFM and later became its Executive Director in 2015. There, he was responsible for the significant growth of its event portfolio and certification business. Previously, Mr. Cuthbert held sales and leadership roles at Greenhaven Partners and Kennedy Information – selling and leading sales teams across a wide variety of industries.

Ryan Dohrn

Founder/CEO, Brain Swell Media

Ryan Dohrn is the founder of media sales training firm Brain Swell Media and the creator of the 360 Ad Sales System taught to over 3,000 ad sales reps in 7 countries. Ryan’s 25 year media sales and marketing career includes leadership roles at PennWell Publishing, Morris Publishing, Disney/ABC TV, Sinclair Broadcasting and The NY Times Company. He is an Emmy Award winner, business book author and has been featured in USA Today and on Forbes.com. Ryan currently works on a monthly basis with over 75 media companies and their related sales and management teams.

Kristina Dorsey

Client Director, CQ-Roll Call Group

Kristina has more than seven years of experience in client relations and sales roles, all of which have been spent working with government affairs professionals specific to legislative tracking and advocacy solutions. She has worked closely with all types of organizations including associations, non-profits, corporations, professional service firms, educational institutions, government agencies, and even the U.S. Congress.

Mitch Eisen

VP Product, Higher Logic

Mr. Eisen has over a decade of experience in email-related technologies, including SMTP protocols, encryption, authentication, and SPAM filtering techniques. He leads the Real Magnet product development team and is a frequent speaker on email marketing, email deliverability, and marketing automation best practices. He holds a degree in International Studies from Hebrew University.

Denise Elliott

CEO, Kiplinger Washington Editors, Inc.

Denise Elliott is the Chief Operating Officer at The Kiplinger Washington Editors, Inc., where she is responsible for strategy and bottom-line P&L responsibility for all media operations, in the Business Forecasting and Personal Finance groups, in print and online.
Purchased February 28, 2019 by Dennis Publishing, LTD, Kiplinger was founded in 1920 by W.M. Kiplinger, the company developed one of the nation’s first successful newsletters in modern times. The Kiplinger Letter, launched in 1923, remains the longest continually published newsletter in the U.S.
Denise is a past president of the SIIA board of directors, a past president of SIPA board of directors, board member at CSPI, publishers of Nutrition Action newsletter and past president of the DC Chapter of SIPA.

Lorna Fenimore

President/COO, Multipub

Lorna has seen the publishing industry evolve from strictly print content to a digital business. In her role as president of Multipub, she partners with her team to adapt their subscription and audience management system to anticipate and meet the technological needs of content, data and media providers. She is active in the industry, having served on the SIPA Board for three years. She is also in her second year on the SIIA Software & Services Division board.

Daniel Fink

Managing Director, Money-Media, a Financial Times company

Dan oversees the Money-Media business unit, which was acquired by the Financial Times in January 2008. Money-Media is a native digital publisher with over 150 staff, nine products, and operations on three continents. Money-Media sits within FT Specialist, the Financial Times' specialist publishing division and publishes premium news across multiple industries. Dan is a member of the FT's senior management group, is the chairman of the FT's 401k investment committee, was elected to the board of directors for the Specialized Information Publishers Association (SIPA), and formerly served as Co-Chair of the East Coast Committee for the National Investment Company Service Association (Nicsa). Dan earned an MBA at Indiana University and was a national champion gymnast.

David Foster

CEO, Business Valuation Resources

David is the CEO of Business Valuation Resources, the Portland, OR-based publisher of transaction, legal and other databases for the business valuation profession. In addition to BVR, Foster was the co-founder of IOMA, Inc., a management publisher he sold to BNA in 1998. He has served on the Boards of 14 information industry companies, and is the Audit Committee chair of Copyright Clearance Center. He has been co-chair of SIPA’s Owners and Publishers Retreat (join us in February 2019!), is a past president, and he won SIPA’s Hall of Fame Award in 2000.

Lynn Freer

President, Spidell Publishing Inc.

Lynn is president and publisher of Spidell Publishing Inc. Spidell is the premier provider of California tax research and education for tax professionals. Spidell offers monthly newsletters and a profit-generating online research service. Over the past 15 years, Spidell has transformed itself into the go-to company for over 18,000 tax professionals who get their education via seminars, webinars and self-study courses.

Tom Gale

President, Gale Media

Thomas is the president of Gale Media, Boulder, Colorado, an information and data services company serving industrial, construction and wholesale distribution markets with research, software and market analytic tools. He is publisher of Modern Distribution Management, a newsletter for wholesale distribution professionals since 1967, as well as www.mdm.com, an online site that reaches an audience of more than 20,000 wholesale distribution executives with industry news and analysis, webcasts, books and other educational materials. Gale Media's Industrial Market Information division is an industrial markets research firm that for 25 years has been helping manufacturers and wholesaler-distributors identify and develop strategies to target the most attractive segments of current and potential markets.

Dave Gardy

Chairman & CEO, TVWorldwide.com, Inc.

A graduate of the U.S. Merchant Marine Academy with a B.S. in Marine Engineering and a Naval Reserve Officer Commission, DAve pioneered the first use of video for ship conversion. From 1985 -1999, he founded two successful nationally-renowned media businesses, Gardy McGrath International and TV on the WEB, both acquired by Ampex Corporation in 1999, when he founded TV Worldwide and became a recognized pioneer in streaming video with the first network of Internet TV channels. He’s been named one of the 25 Most Influential People in Streaming Media.

Paul Gerbino

President, Triumvirate Content Consultants

Paul works with publishers to effectively position their content and data in the right place at the right time for a variety of customers. TCC helps B2B, B2C, STM, scholarly and academic publishers License - negotiate the best deals; Monetize - develop new revenues; and Innovate - create new ways to ensure that content is useful today and continues to be tomorrow. Prior to joining Triumvirate in 2015, Paul was Publisher and Director, Digital Media Advertising of ThomasNet News, where he oversaw the Thomas Industrial Network news division and the digital media advertising operations and product creation.

Terrie Goldstein

Publisher, Hudson Valley Parent magazine

Early on Terrie Goldstein looked to make a difference in her community, first as a community organizer and then as a teacher. Not liking the pressure of the school structure in the 70s, she formed her own marketing and public relations firm. Little did she know that she would use both her editorial and sales skills to become the publisher of Hudson Valley Parent magazine, reaching 75,000 moms in the mid-Hudson Valley of New York.

Bruce Guzowski

President, Guzowski Advisory

Bruce is a highly successful former entrepreneur CEO who now advises other entrepreneur owned media companies on their growth strategies and financing and sale options. His deep knowledge of the industry and 35-year history of work on both the buy-side and sell-side of acquisitions sets him apart from other alternative resources available to small to mid-sized healthcare service and media companies. His clients have ranged from B2B media platforms to lead generation, health care IT service, database and consulting companies.

Megan Hall

Director, Diversified Communications

Megan oversees all event, membership and certification operations supporting the Institute of Finance & Management (IOFM) and Accountex USA, which are part of Diversified’s Business Community Group. This includes customer experience, quality control, project management and product development. Under Megan's leadership, the certification programs were streamlined from a paper-based system to a cloud-based LMS resulting in revenue growth and improved margins. Megan is a graduate of Lee University.

Dan Hanover

Group Vice President, Access Intelligence

Dan runs the largest network of event marketing content in the world, overseeing a print, web and face-to-face content portfolio that includes Event Marketer magazine, The Experiential Marketing Summit, EventTech and The Event Marketing Institute. He also leads the group’s corporate training practice, which produces executive training worldwide for marketing departments at such companies as Mercedes, Cisco, Intel, Microsoft, Coca-Cola Co. and Procter & Gamble. Before joining Access Intelligence in 2011, he built his b-to-b media career working and growing high-performance properties at companies such as Red 7 Media, Penton, Lebhar-Friedman and Nielsen.

Lisa adds articles on leadership, management, and insurance industry issues to IRMI.com. Ms. Harrington began serving as executive vice president and chief marketing officer in September 2013. She is responsible for all aspects of marketing, sales, and client services for the IRMI product line. Previously, she spent 4 years with the Network of Vertafore Users as chief operating officer and acting chief executive officer, and she served as vice president of education for the Florida Association of Insurance Agents for 11 years. Ms. Harrington is also the author of Taking in Strays: Leadership Lessons from Unexpected Places.

Gregory Hart

Director of Marketing, PSMJ Resources, Inc.

Greg is the Director of Marketing for PSMJ’s global publishing, training, and consulting operations. In this role, Greg is responsible for developing the company’s overarching marketing and sales strategies to reach revenue targets for each business unit. He oversees the company’s content marketing program and manages the content development, marketing analytics, and sales resources for PSMJ. PSMJ Resources is worldwide leader in business information products and services for the architecture, engineering, and construction industry.

Christopher Hill

Account Executive, Lytics

Christopher is the Publishing Industry expert at Lytics, where he works with leading media industry clients on how they can execute personalized, data-driven engagement and revenue programs. Before joining the Lytics team, Christopher worked at GoodData, where he consulted with clients on enterprise business intelligence and analytics strategies. He has worked with national and global media brands on digital strategy and technology deployment.

Helen Hoart

Partner, Hoart|Beckerman

Helen has over 25 years in the publishing field, leading both B2B and B2C companies. Currently, she is president of Yikes! Media, a consulting company she founded in 2011. She works with publishing, media and training companies to develop business strategy, marketing programs, new product development, product repositioning, and new product launches.
She has been a long-time supporter of Specialized Information Publishers Association. She served on the board of the SIPA from 1996-2001 and was elected president in 2000. Helen was inducted into the SIPA Hall of Fame in 2007.

Stuart Hochwert

President, Prime Publishing LLC

Stuart is the President and Founder of Prime Publishing LLC. The company creates, aggregates and reviews original cooking and crafting content. They build multi-platform brands that inform, inspire, and engage consumers. Their brands -- all powered by innovation -- span digital websites, e-mail newsletters, social media, e-commerce, and print magazines and books. Their group of 39 owned and operated cooking and crafting properties deliver over 74 million page views monthly. More than 7.6 million readers subscribe to their daily content eNewsletters. This is Hochwert’s fourth start-up.

Christina Karabetsos

Executive Vice President, QCSS, Inc.

Christina is the Executive Vice President at QCSS Smartcenter, an inbound/outbound blended call center located in the Midwest. Christina has over 10 years of experience in the telemarketing industry and has developed and managed dozens of successful telemarketing programs ranging from lead generation and appointment setting to telesales.

Ryan King

Sales Consultant, Informz

Ryan’s began his career in hospitality sales and marketing and spent much of the past decade helping hoteliers connect with their customers. He has spent years helping outline digital strategies that resulted in hotels exceeding budgets and increasing revenues. Ryan brought his passion to Informz where he helps associations & publishers aligns goals to revenue-producing strategies. Informz is the leading provider of marketing automation to the association industry and Ryan uses his “for profit” background and passion to help organizations with their strategic objectives.

Krystle Kopacz

CEO, Revmade

Krystle Kopacz founded Revmade in 2016 to help publishers diversify their revenue streams through new digital products. Based in Washington, DC, Revmade has worked with American Chemical Society, Community Associations Institute, American Society of Association Executives, National Association of Manufacturers and American Trucking Associations, among others.

Rick Longenecker

President, Chief Sales Leader

Rick is president of Chief Sales Leader™, a management consulting firm that shows business leaders how to bring precision -- effectiveness, efficiency and predictability -- to sales execution so they can build sustainable revenue growth year-after-year. Rick is best known for creating TheNaviGuide™ a breakthrough sales approach and knowledge management technology for executing sales calls, onboarding sales people, and for transferring product/service, and pricing information to sales people “live-time”. Rick has spent over thirty years building, improving and merging sales teams in over thirty industries and worked with over twenty SIPA members.

Kim Mateus

Chief Strategy Officer, Mequoda Systems, LLC

Kim partners with the executive management teams of media businesses to develop strategic multiplatform publishing plans, to oversee implementation of publishing business plans, and to help clients grow audience, revenue and profits. She focuses on bringing new partners into the Mequoda client cooperative and also works with Mequoda’s Gold Members to plan transformative, larger-scale projects and services for growing their systems and maximizing profits. Kim monitors overall system best practices for Mequoda’s Haven CXMS platform and tracks industry trends. She founded the Mequoda Research Team in 2004 and has been a principal driver in documenting the thousands of best practices that govern our core Mequoda Method. She’s a frequent speaker at industry events and proudly serves on the board of the Specialized Information Publishers Association (SIPA). Kim earned her degree in journalism from Roger Williams University in Bristol, RI.

Andy McLaughlin

President and CEO, PaperClip Communications

Andy founded PaperClip Communications Inc. in 1993. The company provides information resources to the higher education and K-12 markets. Annually, PaperClip Communications works with more than 3500 colleges, universities, school systems and school districts providing critical information resources to support education and learning initiatives through health, wellness, safety, security and compliance. In early Fall of 2016 PaperClip Communications acquired The Parent Institute in Fairfax, VA. Andy served as the chairperson of SIPA's international workgroup, chairperson for the SIPA Munich conference and as President of the SIPA board of directors in 2011/2012. Andy is a member of the SIPF Hall of Fame.

Mike Mills

Managing Director and Chief Content Officer, Digital Prism Advisors

Mike specializes in helping organizations with content strategy, user-centered design and agile processes. Previously in his career, he has led development and implementation of new digital editorial and publishing strategies as Chief Content Officer for the Society for Science and Public, publisher of Science News magazine, and as Editorial Director for CQ Roll Call. Mike is also a former Editor of the Washington Business Journal and a former staff writer for The Washington Post and CQ Weekly, where he covered technology policy, Congress and the tech sector.

Leslie Norins

President, Medvostat LLC

A physician-scientist by background, Leslie has been a successful, entrepreneurial medical newsletter publisher (B2B) for over 40 years. He has started and grown over 80 newsletters in the course of founding, nurturing and selling four companies. His specialty is spotting promising new topics, and applying his "Secret Sauce" editorial formula to attract and serve subscribers.

Rainey Norins

Vice President, Medvostat LLC

Rainey has 27 years of experience in publishing B2B newsletters for newly-identified audiences. When a promising niche is spotted, it's "all hands on deck" for fast action. She helped set the industry record of launching 30 new newsletters in 30 months. Rainey is Leslie's wife and business partner.

Dan Oswald

CEO, Simplify Compliance

Dan is CEO of Simplify Compliance, a diversified training and information company that offers its customers innovative solutions, authoritative content, and practical, easy-to-use software tools to meet regulatory compliance obligations and adopt best practices. At Simplify Compliance, Dan has orchestrated a number of mergers and acquisitions that have propelled the company’s growth and entrance into new markets. Simplify Compliance operates with four business units; Argosy, BLR, CCMI, and H3.Group, covering financial services, human capital management, telecommunications, and healthcare respectively. Its brands currently include PE Hub, Regulatory Watch, PartnerConnect, BLR, M. Lee Smith Publishers, Thompson HR, Personnel Policy Servies, TelView, Qtel, Decision Health, HCPro, and HealthLeaders Media.

Kelly Parsons

CEO, OpsCat

The CEO of OpsCat and the former CEO of Melcrum Inc, Kelly helps business owners and teams redefine how they create value for customers and build the strategies, products and services to win big in market. Kelly joined Melcrum after running CEB’s Marketing Leadership Council and brought her expertise in strategy and innovation to bear in driving a wholesale transformation of Melcrum’s business model. Kelly holds an MBA from Wharton and an MA in International Economics from Johns Hopkins.

Elizabeth Petersen

Project Director, Simplify Compliance

Elizabeth is currently a project director at Simplify Compliance, working on corporate level branding, product development, and content generation projects. Prior to her current role, Elizabeth served as president of Simplify Compliance’s healthcare division, where she was responsible for growth strategy and the day-to-day operations of the business unit’s primary brands (ACDIS, DecisionHealth, HCPro, and HealthLeaders Media). During her 14 years with the company, Elizabeth has held various roles of increasing responsibility in the business’s sales, product management, and content development departments. Elizabeth has also held editorial positions at Jones & Bartlett Learning and CCI Communications. She holds a BA from Boston University, where she captained the women’s rugby team. Elizabeth is Pragmatic Marketing certified and Sandler sales trained, and currently serves on the board for the Specialized Information Publishers’ Association. Elizabeth lives in the Greater Boston area with her husband and son.

Jeffrey Raymond

VP, Product Strategy & Development, The American Institute of Architects

Bruce Rhodes

Founder, KWI Partners

Bruce is the Founder of KWI Partners, a consulting firm focused on marketing and monetizing content and data services for higher education organizations and media, research and information services companies. Prior to KWI, he has held various product development, audience development and revenue generation roles at MIT Technology Review, Harvard Business Review and Morningstar. He has an undergraduate degree from Duke University and an MBA from the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern.

Rob Ristagno

CEO, Sterling Woods Group

Rob Ristagno is the founder of The Sterling Woods Group and previously served as a senior executive at several digital media and e-commerce businesses, including as COO of America’s Test Kitchen. Starting his career at McKinsey, his focus has always been on embracing technology and analytics to spur strategic growth.
He and the team are passionate about helping clients understand their best customers through data, and developing new product and marketing strategies that exceed expectations - and generate impressive revenues.
Committed to spreading this message, Rob is the author of A Member is Worth a Thousand Visitors and is a regular keynote speaker at conferences around the world. He has been featured on ABC, NBC, CBS, Fox, and Digiday. He holds degrees from the Harvard Business School and Dartmouth College and has taught at both Harvard and Boston College.

Kalani Rosell

VP & Publisher, NewsRx

VP and Publisher at NewsRx, Kalani founded Pubz, an online research solution sourced from periodicals, which merged with NewsRx in 2015. He and the NewsRx team then created the next evolution of the company: BUTTER, a SaaS platform merging NewsRx’s artificial intelligence and publishing prowess to allow professionals to monitor business movements and research. A 2016 SIIA Emerging Leader Finalist, he received his undergraduate and graduate degrees from Yale, and completed the Yale Publishing Course. Kalani surfs and was guest lead performer for the New Haven Ballet.

Jim Sinkinson

Partner, Fired Up! Marketing

Jim Sinkinson founded Infocom Group in 1980 and sold it in 2015. The company produced online information services, newsletters, webinars, books, special reports and live professional development conferences for the corporate communications market. Sinkinson has won numerous awards for his work with publishers, including two Gold Awards from Newsletter on Newsletters, editorial awards from SIPA, and an Axel award for a personalized marketing package he created for Tom Peters’ On Achieving Excellence. In 2015, Sinkinson received a Gold Award from SIPA for his launch of a conference series. Sinkinson served as president of the Northern California chapter of the Specialized Information Publishers Association (SIPA) for 25 years, served on the SIPA board of directors for 12 years, and served as SIPA president in 1993-94. In June, 2001, Jim Sinkinson was named to the SIPA Hall of Fame. He has spoken on specialized information marketing and content at dozens of SIPA events and today, as a publishing consultant, continues to assist publishers worldwide. He offers expertise in copywriting, online marketing, editorial content, memberships, renewals and website development.

Julian Turner

CEO, Electric Word

Julian’s experience is in the paid content side of the information business. He has been a SIPA member and supporter for over 20 years, including as a trainer for marketers and a consultant on subscriptions strategies. Having previously worked at Euromoney/Institutional Investor and Guardian Newspapers, in 2000 he started Electric Word, which is listed on London’s AIM (Alternative Investment Market). Electric Word has evolved over the years and now focuses its activity on high-value digital subscriptions, data and consultancy in the sports industry. Julian’s passions include education and development, both as a school governor and an executive coach, soccer, history and board games.

Linda Vassily

VP of Marketing, Cabot Heritage

Linda is Vice President of Marketing at Cabot Investing Advice in Salem, Massachusetts, one of the oldest and most respected independent investment advisory services in the U.S. Prior to joining Cabot in 2012, Linda served four years as marketing director for United States Biological and 18 years at New England BioLabs, first as a product manager, then as part of the web development team. Linda graduated from MIT with a degree in life sciences.

Ben Wood

Group Subscriptions Director, Infopro Digital

Ben started his career at Emap where he marketed the free-to-paid conversion of Retail Week, before joining Incisive Media in 2007. After a period managing the global Events Marketing team, he became Subscriptions and Marketing Director in 2013. Ben’s remit was to transition the subs business from print to digital, and to switch from individual to enterprise. This involved hiring, building and retraining a global sales team, whilst also ensuring the marketing, data insight and customers service teams changed to support an enterprise operation too. Ben moved to InfoPro Digital in April 2017 as part of the sale of Incisive Media’s Insight Division.

Mary Jo Zandy

Managing Director, Berkery, Noyes & Co.

Mary Jo has over 20 years experience in finance and investment banking. She joined Berkery, Noyes & Co. in 1994 and has held several senior positions including Director of U.S., Corporate Finance for Hill Samuel Securities Corporation (owned by Lloyds Bank), VP of Investment Banking at Donaldson, Lufkin & Jenrette and VP Corporate Finance for Bankers Trust Company. Mary Jo closed and advised on dozens of transactions, with a principal focus on valuations and divestiture work and the sale of privately-held companies in the media and information sectors. She is a prior board member of both Connectiv and SIPA.